Canterbury knobbled weevil: Rare endangered bug discovery causes beetlemania

John Evans with one of the Canterbury Knobbled Weevils he found. PHOTO: SUPPLIED

Retired Canterbury farmer John Evans has had to get used to being in the limelight over the last two months.

Retired Canterbury farmer John Evans has had to get used to being in the limelight over the last two months.

After being credited with the discovery of a new population of critically endangered beetles, the Wakanui man has been on television and in newspapers.

The latter included the

Miami Herald

, which likes to report on all kinds of international news.

Most recently Evans has been interviewed for

New Zealand Geographic

Evans said he was ‘‘a bit embarrassed’’ about all the attention.

The retired farmer had been surprised his serendipitous discovery hit headlines nationwide and overseas.

‘‘I’m beginning to understand the significance of it.’’

Evans was out in the Ashburton Lakes late November last year helping volunteers clear predator traps when he noticed what he thought were ‘‘hare turds’’ near the top of shoots of spear grass.

A closer look revealed it was three beetles, that looked like weevils.

‘‘Then they dived into the middle of the spear grass,’’ he said.

A Canterbury Knobbled Weevil found by John Evans. PHOTO: SUPPLIED

But he put his hand out and caught one just in time, enabling him to take a photo of it.

But he put his hand out and caught one just in time, enabling him to take a photo of it.

He uploaded the image to a bug identification Facebook page, and iNaturalist, spurring interest from entomologists and the suggestion it was the rare Canterbury knobbled weevil.

Soon Department of Conservation staff were travelling to the site, where they found 41 weevils within two-and-a-half hours.

Technical adviser Warren Chinn told

1News

he was stunned at the high catch rate.

‘‘(Evans) found a long-lost population of the weevil which is akin to the takahē in the Murchison Mountains,’’ Chinn proclaimed.

The takahē was long thought extinct when it was rediscovered in 1948.

Department of Conservation technical adviser Warren Chinn (right) and John Evans examine the Canterbury Knobbled Weevil in spear grass. Photo: !News

The discovery was a huge boost for the Canterbury knobbled weevil, which is only known to live in one other location at Burkes Pass about 80 km away.

The discovery was a huge boost for the Canterbury knobbled weevil, which is only known to live in one other location at Burkes Pass about 80 km away.

That population was rediscovered in 2004, more than 80 years after the species was thought to be extinct in 1922.

DOC senior science adviser Tara Murray said Evans’ discovery was fantastic news.

‘‘Because the Burkes Pass population appears to only be hanging on by a thread, the newly discovered population will likely prove to be the difference between this species surviving and slowly disappearing,’’ Murray said.

“Both populations are small, so they could easily be wiped out by fire or a few years of bad growing conditions for the speargrass plants they rely on.”